Panama’s Dark Knight
Retired Army Lt. Col. Thomas D. Morgan, who lives in Steilacoom, Wash., has served in many countries, including Vietnam, Germany, and Belgium, and even has visited “Gotham City.”

In the mid 1970s, I was stationed at Fort Clayton in the Panama Canal Zone before the United States gave it away under President Carter. I was the operations officer and the last in command of the 3rd Civil Affairs Group (Airborne).

We had offices in a large, tropical-style colonial building that originally was built as a hospital. It still contained a hospital ward, but the rest of the building was used as office space and a penthouse bachelor officers quarters. The rooms were large, open bays with high ceilings and screened, louvered windows.

One day there was a commotion in one of the offices. One of the female civilian secretaries had spotted a bat hanging in a corner from the high ceiling. Because of the threat of rabies in Panama—not to mention that the winged beasties were rumored to frequently fly into ladies’ hairdos—the secretary and the others quickly evacuated the office.

Everyone was in an uproar. As the senior officer present, it was my job to deal with the situation. I remembered that the post engineers were responsible for such exotic things as vector control and entomology. Surely, I thought, they handled bats, too. I made a quick phone call and was assured that help was on the way.

The area’s tropical heat and red dirt kept working soldiers looking less than spiffy on a typical duty day in the rainy season, and the man who came to our rescue was no exception. He was a rather scruffy, dirty-looking soldier, who came armed with a large glove that resembled a baseball mitt. After I showed him where the bat was perched, he told us all to leave the room. Most of us did as instructed, but some couldn’t resist the urge to peer in through the door to see what would happen.

The bat, undisturbed and seemingly unaware of its audience, still hung from the ceiling. The soldier moved under it, took his glove, and drew a bead on the bat. Then, with one deft motion, he pitched the glove at it. whack! The glove hit the bat, which fell stunned to the floor. The soldier nonchalantly picked up the bat and carried it from the room. It was the fastest and most efficient civil operation I had ever witnessed. Impressed, I asked the soldier for his name.

“You called about a bat, and I’m the man who takes care of them,” he said. “I’m the bat man.”